Synch

by sunnypack

54 - The Grass is Always Greener...

Medicine, unlike space travel, had advanced quite rapidly, fields opened up and health became a major concern with the populace. As much as technology had helped us conceive a better standard of living, it seemed humans loved inventing problems for themselves.

The Internet had been one of them, but the extranet had been a fairly effective solution. The next step was our own sloth and hygiene. Sloth, due to the fact that foods were so available and transport connected us across the world at blistering speeds. Hygiene, not due to the fact it were excessively dirty or unclean, but the opposite.

Allergies were on the rise.

You may have heard of the hygiene hypothesis. It was a conjecture on the seeming cause of a rise in people with allergies as time spun by. Some scientists posited that allergies were the result of a too clean environment and those whom have not been exposed to enough pathogens tended to have an immune system that reacted excessively to non-essential threats.

Good thing there was a cure, an expensive one though.

It worked similar to a vaccine, allowing the immune system to correctly identify a multitude of ‘immuno-targets’. The cocktail was incredibly difficult to manufacture and relied on the use of nano-robotics, a rare ingredient even when Synch came out. My parents, in addition to buying me a Synch, had given me the full spectrum of medication and allergy prevention medicine, as they had arrived. They sacrificed their own doses. They waved away my concern by stating it was for me. They told me I was their future.

I was young then, and I didn’t understand their sacrifice. I had thought it normal among parents and their children. Was it not obvious the love was unconditional? Perhaps if I had thought more deeply about it, I would have realised earlier that worked both ways.

Advancements such as these led me to believe that humans were a great species. Whatever we wrought, whatever we conceived, whatever we had concerned ourselves with, we had put our minds to it and it had become so. Ever since I arrived in Equestria, it had been a shock to me. Everything was just different.

You know, I don’t think humans are really great for fantasy worlds. What weapons and knowledge I had was severely limited. What strength I had, was practically non-existent when I had started sitting around a lot more often, either soldering or programming. What ingenuity I could conceive was limited by the fact that a whole realm I was ignorant in, magic, was inaccessible to me. It seemed a little too unfair.

While unconscious, I had a lot of time to consider what I could do. I mean it wasn’t a direct thought or conscious motion or a guided idea. It was just a subconscious collection of enlightenment that told me I should probably apply myself the best way I could.

I would approach this the best way I knew how.

Like a frigging scientist, because trust me, I’m an engineer… sort of.

When I woke to spasms and coughs of pain from my traitorous body. I heard a regular noise I thought I never would hear again; it was the steady pulse of an electrocardiogram. Excited, I flung my eyes open and searched around for the equipment. I spotted it immediately beside my bed. Beeping happily. It wasn’t connected to me but I felt overjoyed. I was back on Earth!

I tried to get up but a sharp pain from my lung prevented me from getting very far.

“Argh!” I growled in pain, clutching weakly at my chest.

A familiar clip clop of hooves dispelled any hopes of me being back on Earth. I felt disappointment clutch at my heart before I could stifle it.

The pony looked to be a nurse bearing a small cross, dotted with love hearts on her flank. She looked surprised to see me awake and darted out of the roo before I could even start a proper conversation with her.

A doctor rushed in, accompanying her only momentarily later. I realised the ponies were crystal, I was still in the Crystal Empire then. The Doctor jabbered some medical terminology I wasn’t too familiar with and gave my vitals a quick manual check. I guess the machines around here couldn’t be used on me for some reason, possibly run by magic? I didn’t know but that was likely the case.

The doctor told me they had to resort to a mix of what was called ‘minotaur’ and ‘zebrican’ medicine. An art that had almost been forgotten but was luckily preserved due to the fact that the crystal ponies around here were missing to close to a thousand years.

The human equivalent, from what I could tell, was 1800s style medical procedures, with a lot of cauterising and needle based draining. They hadn’t given me any pain meds for fear of my body chemistry reacting negatively to it. They had soaked everything in alcohol to hopefully disinfect their tools and operated quickly on me while I was unconscious. They risked a saline I.V. to boost my blood pressure, due to my blood loss. Without a substitute it had been touch and go, for a long time, with anxiety and pressure keeping up the doctors and nurses past their shifts.

My eyes had softened when they recounted their tale. They had spent an extraordinary amount of time saving me, me who was not even their own species and they appeared genuinely concerned for my health. I was touched.

I sincerely thanked them, bowing my head in gratitude. I gave them a fairly eloquent speech about how much I appreciated their dedication to their profession. They looked adorably embarrassed and they quickly exited the room.

Luna strode in not to long after they had left.

She smiled in approval when she told me she had overheard the doctors and nurses gushing about my praise. I smiled languidly for a moment then asked Luna about the attack.

“Luna, have you found anything while I was out? I understand if you haven’t in such a short period of time”, I beseeched, looking at Luna with a hopeful expression.

“Did the doctors not mention?” she asked cautiously.

I shook my head in confusion.

“Mention what?” I queried, trying to ascertain exactly what Luna was thinking. Her poker face was too good and all I received was a stoic expression.

“You were out for almost three days”, Luna replied sadly, she looked a little guilty.

“We feared you might never wake up”, she muttered, scuffing a hoof.

I gaped at Luna for a moment.

Three days…

I shook my head. That wasn’t important now. Finding the culprits that were after me was important.

“Luna, did you find anything?” I repeated, my tone harsh. I regretted it almost instantly when she flinched almost imperceptibly.

“Sorry!” I shot out before she could say anything.

“Sorry…” I breathed, sinking back onto the covers.

“I guess it’s the stress. I guess I’m just not used to getting stabbed”, I joked weakly, covering my eyes with my arm as I leant back.

I could hear Luna approaching.

“That’s quite alright”, she spoke gently, as I felt her muzzle nuzzle me at the side of my forehead. “You’ve been through quite an ordeal.”

I nodded.

She sighed, pausing as if to assess my condition, whether I could take the information or not. I waited patiently for her to make a decision.

“The knife bore the markings of a necromancer guild”, she sighed.

I didn’t know what to think.

Necromancers?

What in the world?

Author's Note:

Just a quick update and I'm back into my work.

I'll update this A/N later.

Sorry if you were expecting a 'Next Chapter' snippet.

Also as a side note, how are the releases for my chapters, I know they're in a 'short and sweet' 'moment to moment' style but does that appeal? It's just a new way of writing for me, I feel like it keeps the suspense and makes it easier to pump out updates. If you want I can revert to a more traditional publishing style where I put a substantial amount of writing inbetween updates. Unfortunately the downsides are that updates don't come so often. Thoughts?

Also I'd like to sincerely thank Amber for promoting me (I know this was a while back, so sorry I didn't visit your page!) thank you to everyone else who has promoted my story but I have not noticed or known about, I deeply appreciate the support. I don't often go to other pages and personally thank my readers because that would be an enormous effort and even though I really do want to thank readers personally, I think that time is better spent making better chapters or editing this work so it's there and amazing for you to read.

Thank you all (I know I say this every chapter) but thanks for reading.

Comments

[Rain Nero]

Every time you say "Trust me, I'm an Engineer", I feel the need to link this video...

[Amber flicker]

I like the way you do updates. On other stories I'm sitting here waiting for updates for up to months at a time.

Haha, I didn't even expect you to visit my page. Nothing of much interest there. Anyways, You're welcome!